We have a family apple tree and it is ripe. So we have cookers, a sweet red apple and a russet - all on the one tree! The other tree is still clinging onto its teeny little apples - it is a late variety that hasn't grown its usual large apples this year.

This year we are making a big effort to store most of the crop. Usually we just invite the neighbours into scrump them

The good ones are being wrapped in paper or bubble wrap stored in blue mushroom trays.

The bruised and bird pecked ones are being processed in a few different ways. I want to see which method/s work best:

1. cored, peeled and sweated down in butter, then open frozen and bagged.2. cored, peeled, dropped in boiling water for a moment, dropped in cold water, drained, bagged and frozen.3. just as 2 but open frozen prior to bagging.

I don't bother with anything fancy, just peel and core (put in water so they don't go brown), slice into chunky slices, pop into plastic bag and freeze. They are fine used in crumbles or cooked down to apple sauce as needed. The only thing I do do is shake them into a thin layer in the bag and freeze flat so they separate easily.Mine are eaters but we used to do the same with my mum's bramleys.

All apples are graded Now / Soon /Good /Best - windfalls and damaged are given away or dealt with, slightly damaged are used soon, good & best are stored in boxes and examined later (regraded). Tiny but good are kept for the birds in hard weather. We have too many to use them all, or wrap them.

Oh we definitely have too many to deal with. I am wrapping the perfectest of the perfect ones. I'll get bored with it very soon! I might have a look in supermarkets for the apple boxes with dividers in instead.

The chickens like them. We leave loads for the birds. Even the ones I freeze are properly edible.

Fully cooked, especially if you have the oven on anyway (one for now one for later). Then if you are in a hurry for a pudd you just have to defrost. And can have it hot with custard or cold with ice cream.

You can jar apple sauce/apple butter (like a concentrated sauce with spices) - you'll need lemon juice to lower the pH to stop bacteria growing and keep apples from going too brown plus sugar. You can cut pieces a bit chunkier when cooking up, then put into clean jars and then with lids loose, heat up in a pan of water to sterilise before closing the lids. They store for a few months.

I have a dehydrator (got this one from Westfalia) and I dry slices of apples and put them into sealed vacuum bags. They are a bit too chewy to eat from the bag (well mine are LOL) but great for popping a few slices into curries and other stews.

On Saturday afternoon I made three apple pies; one for Sunday lunch and two for the freezer. Son and DiL came for lunch and took one spare pie. BiL also came for lunch and took the other. My plan of batch cooking and freezing for later has a flaw. Next time, as soon as the pies are cold they are going in the freezer. To be fair, I always intended to offer one to DiL thinking that she might like to take one back and was giving her the choice of two sizes. BiL just snaffled the other one.

I could get apple boxes from Te$co. Once apples are in, do they need to be covered and/or left in the dark?

Bea; 19 hens (most of whom I intended to get); 6 bantams (which I never intended to have); old Benji dog and young Toby dog (who I definitely wanted). Three years into country living and loving it.

rhubarb93 wrote:I don't bother with anything fancy, just peel and core (put in water so they don't go brown), slice into chunky slices, pop into plastic bag and freeze. They are fine used in crumbles or cooked down to apple sauce as needed.

Snap! I do just the same and its perfect for cooking in winter, Any good ones are stored in newspaper in a fruit crate in the cellar

I now have a new load ready to dip in lemon juice and freeze. Another load to be dipped in sugar and cinnamon and I will be making apple cheese this weekend - I had forgotten how much we liked it last year.

Loads of apples stull left, so more are being sorted all the time. I can't even put them out at the gate, everyone round here has more than enough of their own!

This is maybe a bit late, but I slice thinly with a couple of tablespoons of sugar and a little water in the bottom of a 2 litre glass basin and microwave for approx 7 mins. Let them cool right down, then into freezer bags.

When I have done as many as I want to I then do a whole weekend of pie making/baking. The reason I do it at the weekend is our electric is 20/20 and we get 20% off from Fri eve 10p.m. until Mond 8a.m., that is until the clocks change. Do keep some apples in freezer with an already made crumble mix to make crumbles at short notice. Usually do 50/50 with blackberries which I have previously frozen too.

I did try the open/tray freezing the other year, but didnt like it very much so reverted back to stewing.